Birds Around Us: Asian Green Bee-eater

An Asian Green Bee-eater feeding on a scarlet skimmer.

Merops orientalis (scientific name) or the Asian Green Bee-eater was refereed to as "beauty with brains"in an article by the hindu and it does live upto its name. These tiny exquisitely coloured birds are natural predators of bees as their name suggests. However, even for them, they aren't immune to a bee's poisonous sting.

So how then are these little wonders able to feast on the bees? Well, here's why they are the beauty with brains. They remove the poisonous sting of the bees by rubbing, smacking or hitting them on a the perch before swallowing them completely.

These small birds are insectivores meaning they eat insects and so often, they show incredible acrobatics in the air as they catch other flying insects to eat like dragonflies, butterflies, moths, grasshoppers and other small beetles.

A study done on them observed that these Asian Green Bee-eaters are most active in the morning hours after warming themselves up in the sunshine for an hour or so.

Where and what can you find Asian Green Bee-eaters doing?

These birds are often observed sitting on cables in small groups. Mostly found in pairs due to their monogamous nature. They can be spotted in forest clearings, agricultural lands where there is water and sand available nearby.

The Bee-eaters perform acrobatic stunts while it's trying to catch their prey. They also indugle in behaviours like dust bathing like many other birds. To dust-bathe, the bee-eaters go very close to the ground and then wriggle their bodies in the loose sand while flapping their wings which is followed by vigorous shaking to remove dust particles and preening of feathers using their bills.

When we think of birds and their nests, we think of twigs carefully collected and placed on a tall tree. Not for the Bee-eaters though. The Bee-eaters make a horizontal tunnel usually in sand or in the side of an earth cutting or borrow pit . This tunnel leads to a wider egg chamber and both the sexes take part in making the nest and caring for the young.

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Citation

Mishra, Swetaleena. (2019). The Ecology of Merops Orientalis. International Journal of Scientific Research in Biological Sciences. 6. 12-14. 10.26438/ijsrbs/v6i5.1214.